Have cell phone, will get medical care

A couple of weeks ago, I came across a Business Week headline that warmed the cockles of my Health Horizons blogger heart: "Medical Advances--Through Your iPhone?" The article describes several mobile phone health apps. For example, a University of California researcher has reduced a complex electromagnetic imaging machine (about a $10,000 piece of equipment) to a portable electromagnetic scanner that plugs into a regular cellphone and beams the data to a computer, which generates an image that can be transmitted to a doctor or hospital. This remote configuration will cost only hundreds of dollars and will bring imaging technology to the two-thirds of the world's population that otherwise has no such access.

The iPhone, with its large color screen and easy Web access, has been a boon to companies developing graphics-rich medical applications. Life Record enables physicians to use the iPhone anytime, anyplace, to view patients' medical records, including electrocardiograms and brain scans. Next month, Life Record plans to introduce a consumer application that will allow individuals to access their own medical records via an iPhone for a nominal annual fee ($50). As the article explains, "When visiting a new doctor or specialist, iPhone-toting patients will be able to pull up all of their medical information, including past X-rays and another physician's notes, by connecting with Life Record's servers over the Internet." How cool is that?!

BeWell Mobile has developed an application that demonstrates the potential for mobile devices to play a critical role in the remote care of patients with chronic diseases like asthma and diabetes. Its technology allows diabetics to enter their home test results into their cell phones and transmit the data to their doctors. If a patient's blood sugar levels spike, the software can advise the patient to avoid certain foods or try a different medication, or a doctor may call with more personal recommendations.

Business Week reports that,

A recent two-year trial with BeWell at clinics operated by San Mateo Medical Center in California has shown the software can drastically cut down on emergency room visits. The trial involved 50 asthmatic patients, ages 12 to 20, who had previously landed in the ER four to five times a year. But using BeWell, none of the participants came to the emergency room during the trial. "We can actually change patients' behavior, and that's the big breakthrough," says Peter Boland, business development director at BeWell.

Although I have been so busy recently preparing for our Spring
Conference on Green Health that I didn't blog about this story sooner, the article highlights some of the signalss we are tracking as we prepare for our Fall Conference on Mobile Health. Stay tuned for more!